


Happier

by WhoGeek



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Break Up, Divorced Gabriel Reyes, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gabriel Reyes is a good friend, I Made Myself Cry, I'm sad so I wrote painful things, Jack Morrison can't resist a straight joke, Jack Morrison/Gabriel Reyes UST, Light Angst, M/M, Platonic Cuddling, Pre-Fall of Overwatch, i will fight you on that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-18
Updated: 2019-01-18
Packaged: 2019-10-12 01:24:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17457938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WhoGeek/pseuds/WhoGeek
Summary: Jack's on vacation so he can spend time with Vincent but things haven't been going well for a while.





	Happier

**Author's Note:**

> This was all because I was listening to [Happier](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE87rQkXdNw) and it's a very sad song and today is a sad anniversary so I'm sad and needed some catharsis. That ended up being a whole fic of Jack being sad and Gabe being a good supportive friend.
> 
> Barely beta-ed.

Jack slides onto a barstool and flags down the bartender. He doesn’t have to say anything, he’s been here often enough in the last week the guy just sets a glass of whiskey down. The bartender is kind enough not to mention that the baseball cap doesn’t actually hide his identity. Everyone in Bloomington, hell, everyone who hasn’t been living under a rock the last few years knows his face. But it’s nice to pretend to be just another anonymous guy in this dive. Just for a while.

“What’s a guy gotta do to get a beer around here, huh?” Long years of practice at being around Gabriel keep Jack from tensing up when he takes the next stool.

“What are you doing here, Gabe?”

“Trying to get a beer, what’s it look like, Jackie?”

Jack glares at Gabriel. “If I remember correctly, you’re supposed to be in Hong Kong. What are you doing here, Gabriel.”

Gabe is silent for a moment before he sighs and looks away. “Ana called. Said some Paps had been snapping photos of you going into a dive bar several times this week.” The bartender swings by to refill Jack’s glass and Gabe gets his beer. “Figured you needed a friend.”

Jack wants to slump sideways against Gabe’s shoulder in relief. “Thanks.”

Gabe sways in to knock their shoulders together, brief, companionable. “I’ve still got your back, Golden Boy. So, what’s eating you?”

“Been fighting with Vincent.” Jack swirls the liquid in his glass around and takes a sip. “We’re always fighting now.”

“You guys talked to anyone about it?”

“I’m talking to you.” Gabe glares and Jack sighs. “We did a couple sessions with a counselor but Vince is here and I’m…” Jack waves one hand, as though he can encompass the whole of ‘Running Overwatch’ with the gesture. “Even though I make time for us it’s never enough.”

Gabe is silent, taking a couple swigs of beer. “Jack...”

“Fuck, Gabe, how did you know?”

Gabe winces but doesn’t pretend he doesn’t understand. “We talked. Realized that it was a relief when I had to leave. For both of us. We wanted different things. Part of me still loves her. I think a part of her still loves me. We’re… sorta friends still. And I do my best to visit regularly for my daughter.” Gabe’s right hand goes to the metal bracelet on his left wrist, rubbing over the capsule that holds a lock of his daughter’s hair. “But yeah. We wanted different things and pretending we could make it work was just making it worse.” Gabe chuckles a little. “I’m not like Torb, yeah?”

Jack chuckles as well and Gabe doesn’t say anything about how wet it sounds. “I guess I’m not, either.”

They drink in silence for a while, Jack collecting himself and discreetly wiping the tears from his eyes.

“Do you ever wonder if you could have made it work?”

“I try not to, but yeah. Thing is, I don’t think I’d change anything if I had to do it all again. If I’d never gotten married I wouldn’t have an amazing daughter. But if I’d settled down with them I wouldn’t have helped save lives all over the world.” He pauses and turns towards Jack. “I wish I could have done both, somehow, but I ended up having to choose. Isabelle understood when we were a military family. It was still hard but we made it work.” He finishes off his beer and thunks the bottle onto the bar. “Things were still such a mess after the Crisis, Isabelle was starting to resent me for not coming home, I was starting to resent her for asking that when there was still so much to do…” Gabe takes a shaky breath. “We’d both seen friends whose parents stayed together far too long. Best to separate before we fucked up Dani with fighting every time I was home.”

Jack stares down into his empty glass, waves the bartender off when he comes to refill it. “You got a room?”

Gabe turns narrowed eyes towards Jack, suspicious. “For a couple nights, yeah.”

“I uh… Would you mind if…”

“Jack.”

“I think I’ve known.” He laughs but it’s a high, nervous, half-strangled sound. “I didn’t really even unpack this time.”

“If you fucking bug out on Vincent without goddamn talking I will kick your ass all the way to Zurich and back.” The fierceness in Gabe’s face fades quickly back to concern. “But yeah, I’ve got room for ya, little shithead.”

“You think I should do it now?”

“Putting it off isn’t going to make it any easier.”

Jack sighs and scrubs his hands over his neck. “Yeah. Vince’s place isn’t far from here. I’ll…”

“I know. I’ll be here.” Jack stands and reaches for his wallet but Gabe waves him off. “Go, I’ll cover your tab tonight.”

“Right.” He turns and walks to the door, hears Gabe talking to the bartender as he steps out into the chilly fall air.

Part of him doesn’t want to do this. Vincent is brilliant, sweet, witty, confident. But Vincent doesn’t want to leave Bloomington, and Jack doesn’t want to move back.

All too soon he’s swiping the keycard that lets him into Vincent’s building, climbing the stairs, knocking on Vincent’s door. He can hear the deadbolt being slid back and then Vincent is pulling open the door.

“Jack!” Vincent smiles but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “I didn’t expect you to knock.”

“Sorry, forgot my keys.” Vincent steps back, face falling a little as Jack steps into the apartment. Jack looks around and it’s like seeing the apartment for the first time in a long while. He can’t see anything he’s added to the place. No little touches of his personality. It just makes the distance between them more obvious. “I uh, think we need to talk.”

Vincent's face falls even further but he doesn't seem surprised. “Oh.” He calmly closes the door.

“You don’t seem surprised.”

“I’m not. I think I wanted to believe we could make it work.”

“So did I.” Tears well up in Vincent’s eyes and Jack wants to step closer, comfort him. It’s not his place anymore. “But we want different lives. You’re happy here, you… you’d resent me if I asked you to move to Zurich with me and I’d resent you if you asked me to stay here with you.”

Vincent sobs and Jack jerks forward, hands coming up before he forces himself to stop. “God, Jack, I don’t want you to be right but you are.”

Jack’s vision goes watery and he looks down for a second. “We’ve both known. We’ve just been,” he chokes for a moment as the tears start falling down his own face, “We’ve been trying to ignore it. I wanted our love to be enough but that’s not the kind of people we are. I’m sorry, Vincent.”

“Me too, Jack.”

“I uh, I’m going to get my stuff and I’ll… I’ll get out of your place.” Vincent nods and sinks down onto the couch as Jack heads for the bedroom. It only takes a minute to grab his toiletries and a few shirts not already in his bag. Vincent watches, eyes dry now, as Jack pulls the keycard out of his pocket, grabs his keyring and pulls the apartment key off, setting both on the table by the door. He pauses with his hand on the doorknob. “You should… you should message Aaron. Or Ryan. Just… Don’t be alone tonight?”

“What about you? Do you have someplace to go tonight?” Vincent’s voice is quiet, rough.

“Yeah. I’m sorry.” Vincent nods and Jack steps out the door, pulling it closed behind him.

The walk back to the little dive bar seems to take forever and no time at all. Gabe is waiting outside and his lips quirk up in a sad smile. Jack's heart thumps painfully in his chest. Gabe doesn’t say anything, just slings one arm around Jack’s shoulders and leads him away from the bar.

Jack doesn’t even pay attention to where Gabe is leading him, but his eyes bug a little bit when they step into the lobby of a very nice hotel. “Gabe…” The faintly chastising tone gets a chuckle out of Gabe.

“No, I’m not expensing this. Paid for with my own money.” Jack relaxes as Gabe steers him into the elevator and they finally separate so Gabe can press the right button. They lean against the walls as the doors close and the elevator lurches into motion.

“You’ve always gone for cheap-but-clean, Gabe. Why the splurge?”

Gabe stares at him until the doors open and he pushes off to lead Jack down the hall. “I put some puzzle pieces together and figured you might need someplace to land for a night or two.” A keycard pressed to a door sensor and Jack is being ushered into a large suite. Gabe throws the deadbolt and flips the security lock before prodding Jack further in, prying his bag out of his hand.

Gabe steps through the door into the bedroom and Jack’s stoic facade cracks and crumbles as he collapses onto the couch. “Gabe.” It comes out as a sob and Gabe is back in the room and pulling Jack into a hug, hands big and warm and smoothing up and down his back as Jack sobs into his shoulder.

Gabe keeps up a steady stream of soft encouragement and reassurances, gently rocking them back and forth.

Eventually Jack’s tears slow and stop, but he doesn’t pull away and Gabe doesn’t push him away. Everything aches, feels like Gabe’s arms are the only things keeping him from falling to pieces.

He must have fallen asleep because he wakes up stretched as far out as he can be on the too-small couch, the tv on with barely any volume to some nature show, his head pillowed on Gabe’s lap and Gabe’s fingers carding through Jack’s hair. “How you feeling, Jackie?”

“This fucking sucks.”

Gabe huffs out a breath. “Yeah. Yeah it does.”

They lapse into silence, the motion of Gabe’s fingers lulling Jack back towards sleep. “Thanks.”

Gabe’s fingers still for a moment. “You did the same for me. Damn straight I’m gonna be here for you.”

Jack waits a beat before his lips curl into a smirk. “Well, maybe not ‘straight’.”

“You asshole. Shut the fuck up.” Jack snickers as Gabe’s fingers never falter in his hair. “You’re gonna be alright, Jackie. We’ll go do something dumb and touristy tomorrow, maybe go visit your folks. Then you’ll be headed back to Zurich day after that. Eventually it won’t feel so consuming. Helps to keep busy. Focus on your friends.”

“Other important relationships?” Jack hopes Gabe misses the longing in his voice.

“Yeah.” Gabe’s fingers stop and withdraw. “We should get some sleep. It’s been a long day for both of us.”

Jack sits up reluctantly, helps turn off the lights in the room before following Gabe into the bedroom of the suite. The comfortable quiet between them is familiar as they strip down and each climb into a bed. “Thanks again, Gabe.”

“I got your back, Golden Boy.”

**Author's Note:**

> This was written in a flurry of angst and getting yelled at over messenger by my friends for giving them sad things.


End file.
